LTTE bomber blows himself up; 1 dead
Colombo, September 28
At least 10 LTTE cadres and five soldiers were killed in fierce clashes in the embattled northern Sri Lanka where a Tamil Tiger suicide bomber detonated him killing one civilian and injuring nine others.

Punjabi singer Malkit Singh wins award
London, September 28
Malkit Singh, legendary Punjabi pop singer, has won the NRI Institute Excellence Award for 2008 for his contribution to populare the traditional bhangra at the international stage.

Ban condemns blasts in India
United Nations, September 28
Asserting that no cause or grievances can justify terrorism, the UN secretary-general Ban
Ki-moon has voiced deep concern over recent string of bombings in several Indian cities and targeting of places of high civilian population.

India a safe tourist
destination: Official
London, September 28
India is as safe as other tourist destinations in the world and there should be no apprehensions about the safety of visitors to the country, a senior official has said.

No ambiguity on J&K stand
Pakistan has said there is no ambiguity in its position on Kashmir, but it has brought a “pragmatic” perspective to bear on the issue and do things that will help people of Kashmir.

9 killed in Balochistan clashes
At least nine persons, including two jawans of the Frontier Constabulary (FC), were killed and seven tribesmen injured in fierce fighting in Balochistan's Dera Bugti district on Saturday.

Cobra helicopters: US approves sale
The US Defence Department has approved sales of an unspecified number of Cobra helicopters to Pakistan.
The copters are refurbished version of AH-1F Cobra helicopters with associated equipment, a report received here said.

Strike cripples Nepal
Kathmandu, September 28
The Maoist-led coalition government on Sunday witnessed first ever-nationwide general strike called by the National People’s Front
(NPF), a fringe left party in the Constituent Assembly.

Mission accomplished: Chinese astronauts return
Beijing, September 28
China’s three astronauts landed safely back on earth today after a challenging voyage, including a space walk, that showcased the country’s technological mastery and put it one step closer to the
Moon.

Noose tightens around Somali pirates
Mogadishu, September 28
Somali pirates, who seized a Ukrainian freighter carrying arms, were surrounded today by several foreign warships off the central coast of Somalia, a ranking Somali official and witnesses said.

Floods kill 50 in Vietnam, Thailand
Hanoi, September 28
Flash floods and landslides have killed 50 persons in Vietnam and Thailand, swept away thousands of homes and inundated farmland, official reports said today.

World mourns ‘king of cool’ Paul Newman
London, September 28
Images of US actor Paul Newman, who died late on Friday, adorned newspaper front pages around the world on Sunday, his piercing blue eyes vying for attention alongside headlines of the global financial crisis.

Colombo, September 28
At least 10 LTTE cadres and five soldiers were killed in fierce clashes in the embattled northern Sri Lanka where a Tamil Tiger suicide bomber detonated him killing one civilian and injuring nine others.

Meanwhile, the Sunday Observer reported that Tamil Tigers’ stronghold of Kilinochchi was now a “ghost town with the LTTE withdrawing all its offices, business establishments, hotels and media centres”.

“This follows the rapid advancement of the security forces towards the region from various directions in the Wanni,” the Lankan daily quoted informed sources as saying.

Reports of fighting have increased in recent months amid government’s declaration to crush the group by the end of the year. Fighting, which has escalated in the past two years, further flared after the government in January pulled out of the 2002 cease-fire pact with the rebels.

The Tamil Tigers have carried out hundreds of suicide bombings against their enemies, including political and economic targets.

According to information, the suspected Tamil Tiger suicide bomber came on a bicycle and exploded the bomb around 3.15 pm.

As many as nine persons, including four army personnel, were among the victims who suffered injuries due to the explosion and they were rushed to the Anuradhapura hospital, the police sources said. — PTI

London, September 28
Malkit Singh, legendary Punjabi pop singer, has won the NRI Institute Excellence Award for 2008 for his contribution to populare the traditional bhangra at the international stage.

Lord Karan Billimoria, chairman of the UK-India business council, presented the award at a glittering ceremony held at the Radisson SAS Portman Hotel here last night.

The citation said, “today, the worldwide popularity of this folk music is entirely credited to his famous rendition of traditional bhangra songs like ‘Gur Nalo Ishq’ and ‘Tootak Tootak’,the songs that revolutionised Punjabi music forever”.

Other recipients of the Excellence Awards included Lord Mayor Manjula Sood of Leicester, the first Asian female Mayor in the United Kingdom.
Earlier, Malkit had been honoured by Queen Elizabeth II at Buckingham Palace with the award of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire, a rare honour that defined his stature as a singer.

R Seetharaman, chief executive of Doha bank won the Excellence Award for his outstanding performance in the banking sector in the Middle-East. He was adjudged the ‘Banker of the year’ in 2007.— PTI

United Nations, September 28
Asserting that no cause or grievances can justify terrorism, the UN secretary-general Ban
Ki-moon has voiced deep concern over recent string of bombings in several Indian cities and targeting of places of high civilian population.

"The secretary-general condemns these reprehensible acts that have caused the death and injury of many civilians and calls for the perpetrators to be brought to justice,” his spokesperson said. — PTI

London, September 28
India is as safe as other tourist destinations in the world and there should be no apprehensions about the safety of visitors to the country, a senior official has said.

“Whenever any incident takes place, we take prompt action and deal with the case in a fast- track way and see that exemplary punishment is given to culprits as per the law,” S.
Banerjee, tourism secretary of India, said.

“There should be no apprehension about safety of tourists. India is a safe, if not safer, place for tourists,” he said.

His statement comes in the wake of the recent travel advisory by the British Foreign Office after the serial blasts in Delhi.

The revised advisory cautioned Britons to be more vigilant in the vicinity of busy public places in India, stating that there was a “high threat of terrorism throughout India”.

Banerjee said the union government had also made a proposal to state governments that they could have special security organisations, with retired personnel drawn from the ministries of defence and home affairs.

“The idea is to recruit ex-servicemen to man the security
organisations,” he said.

Noting that there had been a steady increase in both foreign and domestic tourist traffic in India, Banerjee said the total number of foreign tourist arrival in 2007 was 5.08 million, registering an annual growth of 14.3 per cent and the country earned foreign exchange to the tune of $11 billion. Similarly, there were 557 million domestic tourists in the country during the same period, he said. — PTI

Pakistan has said there is no ambiguity in its position on Kashmir, but it has brought a “pragmatic” perspective to bear on the issue and do things that will help people of Kashmir.

Foreign secretary Salman Bashir while talking to mediapersons to explain the outcome of the Zardari-Manmohan Singh meeting in New York denied that Pakistan had moved away from the UN Security Council resolutions on Kashmir.

However, he conceded that the Jammu and Kashmir issue had been confined for the present to creating confidence- building measures
(CBMs). Zardari received a lot of flak from conservative politicians and media for deviating from Pakistan’s traditional Kashmir policy at the meeting with Singh and in his address to the
UNGA.

“We want to take concrete steps,” said Bashir, explaining that while the UN resolutions continued to represent the “legal framework” for settling the Kashmir issue, a conscious decision was made by Pakistan to adopt a bilateral approach. He said India was no longer hesitant to acknowledge Kashmir as an issue that remained to be settled.

It had been agreed to trade 21 items across the Line of Control
(LoC), a development that would help the Kashmiri people.

The foreign secretary said the composite dialogue with India had come under stress this summer, with India accusing Pakistan of being behind the bombing of the Kabul Embassy and of violations of the LoC in Kashmir.

The composite dialogue had come to a standstill and scheduled meetings between the two sides had failed to take place. The situation had changed as should be evident from the joint statement issued after the Zardari-Manmohan Singh meeting in New York. It had also been agreed to hold meetings scheduled for this year by December-end.

Islamabad, September 28
Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari’s recent offhand compliment to the US vice-presidential hopeful Sarah Palin has created quite a flutter in the real and the virtual world.

During his meeting with Palin in New York on the sidelines of the UN general Assembly, Zardari called her “gorgeous” and said “now I know why the whole of America is crazy about you”.

And when Zardari was asked to keep shaking hands with Palin for the cameras, he said, “If he’s (the aide) insisting, I might hug.” In the virtual world blogs have been dedicated to the “meeting”. One such blog is titled “Zardari flirts with Sarah Palin -- calling her gorgeous and offers to hug” and gives details of the Zardari-Palin encounter.

“I do not mean to suggest that this is in anyway a crime, but being the President of Islamic Republic of Pakistan there are some protocols that should be adhered to in an effort to uplift the respect and dignity of Pakistan and to the office he has been assigned,” wrote a blogger called “teethmaestro”.

He also claimed to have warned about such a faux pas in an earlier post. “As suspected from my earlier post where I shuddered at the thought of what Asif Ali Zardari might serve up to Washington during his trip to attend the UN General Assembly, well the games have begun”.

Several jokes are doing the rounds on the meeting and Facebook has dedicated two groups to the encounter. A group called “Zardari should marry Sarah Palin for the sake of world peace!” has enrolled 13 members so far.— PTI

At least 225 women have been killed in incidents of “karo kari” (honour killing) in the past six months across Pakistan, according to a survey conducted by the Aurat Foundation.

The organisation said though honour killing had different names in different areas of Pakistan, the traditions remain the same across the country.

Malik Asghar of the Aurat Foundation said the survey covered details of women killed for honour between January and June 2008. According to the survey, the number of women murdered for reasons other than honour was 722. The survey revealed that only two accused in such cases registered during the past six months had been sentenced while the rest were pending in courts.

At least nine persons, including two jawans of the Frontier Constabulary (FC), were killed and seven tribesmen injured in fierce fighting in Balochistan's Dera Bugti district on Saturday.

Four FC personnel were injured in the pitched battle between the two sides which broke the three- week-long unilateral ceasefire announced by Baloch nationalist organisations in response to the government's goodwill gestures, including the release of senior leaders.While officials confirmed nine deaths, sources said nearly 24 persons might have been killed in the clashes.

The officials said that security forces had destroyed two camps of militants and seized a huge quantity of arms and ammunition. The fighting erupted in the Ganz Nullah area when an FC patrol was attacked.

Meanwhile, a man who claimed himself to be the spokesman for the banned Baloch Republican Army and identified himself as Sarbaz Baloch said his organisation was responsible for the attack.

The US Defence Department has approved sales of an unspecified number of Cobra helicopters to Pakistan.
The copters are refurbished version of AH-1F Cobra helicopters with associated equipment, a report received here said.

The Pentagon said the refurbished helicopters would help Pakistan’s efforts to defeat Taliban and
Al-Qaida fighters in its tribal areas and to conduct other counter terrorism missions.

Pakistan has often complained that the US has withheld supply of requisite equipment for Pakistani troops fighting the tribal militants and
Al-Qaida in areas bordering Afghanistan.

The offer is part of a package of $ 1.01 billion of weapons for the four US allies - France, Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Pakistan.

The Pentagon’s Defence Security Cooperation Agency, which oversees major arms sales, said it notified Congress about six separate deals in recent days.

The prime contractor will be the US Helicopter in Ozark, Alabama. Lawmakers have thirty days to block the sales, although such action is rare as arms deals with the US partners are carefully vetted before the Pentagon announces them.

Kathmandu, September 28
The Maoist-led coalition government on Sunday witnessed first ever-nationwide general strike called by the National People’s Front (NPF), a fringe left party in the Constituent Assembly.

Normal life has been crippled across the country on Sunday due to nationwide general strike called by the NPF protesting against the May 28 Constituent Assembly’s proclamation that declared Nepal as a federal state.

Academic institutions and market places shut down and vehicular services affected throughout the day.

According to the police, around a dozen vehicles were vandalised in Kathmandu by the cadres and supporters of the NPF on charge of defying their general strike. Meanwhile, the police have arrested four-dozen people in connection with bandh-related violence.

Beijing, September 28
China’s three astronauts landed safely back on earth today after a challenging voyage, including a space walk, that showcased the country’s technological mastery and put it one step closer to the
Moon.

Spacewalker Zhai Zhigang and two other astronauts on board the Shenzhou VII, landed on the steppes of northern Inner Mongolia region, where helicopters with crews trained in search and rescue were on stand-by.

The men, who told mission control that they were safe and well, can expect a heroes’ welcome from the whole country when they have recovered from the journey and are allowed out of quarantine, which the official Xinhua agency said would last around half a month.

Previous space pioneers, now national icons, have been showered with tributes and gifts ranging from luxury housing for their families to traditional operas performed in their
honour.

It was China’s third manned space mission. The ability to space walk is the key to a longer-term goal of assembling a space lab and then a larger space station, and may be one day making a landing on the moon. — Reuters

Mogadishu, September 28
Somali pirates, who seized a Ukrainian freighter carrying arms, were surrounded today by several foreign warships off the central coast of Somalia, a ranking Somali official and witnesses said.

We are getting information that three warships are tracking the pirates and two of them are very close to the hijacked ship,” said adviser to the presidency of the semi-autonomous region of Puntland Bile Mohamoud Qabowsade.

“One of these ships is from the US and the other two are from the EU countries,” he said, without naming the European countries. The defence ministries of the UK, France and Germany told that their sailors were not involved in this operation.

The MV Faina was seized on Thursday with a crew of 21 as it neared the Kenyan port of Mombasa with a cargo of tanks, grenade launchers and ammunition for the Kenyan army.

The pirates are reportedly seeking $ 35 million to release a Ukrainian freighter, a maritime official said yesterday. They asked individuals in charge of the hijacking of the Ukranian ship to come aboard the navy ship for talks,” said a tribal chief and local fishermen.

According to the Ukrainian defence ministry, the Faina is carrying 33 Soviet-type T-72 tanks and armaments being delivered by Kiev as part of an arms deal with Kenya. — AFP

Hanoi, September 28
Flash floods and landslides have killed 50 persons in Vietnam and Thailand, swept away thousands of homes and inundated farmland, official reports said today.

In Vietnam, the death toll from typhoon Hagupit, which struck the Philippines and China earlier in the week, has jumped to 32 with another five persons missing.

The Red River was expected to reach dangerously high levels, rising to 8.6 m, it said. In Thailand, the death toll from floods triggered by heavy monsoon rain had risen to 18, while nearly 1,90,000 persons had been treated for water-related illnesses and injuries, the health ministry said. — Reuters

London, September 28
Images of US actor Paul Newman, who died late on Friday, adorned newspaper front pages around the world on Sunday, his piercing blue eyes vying for attention alongside headlines of the global financial crisis.

Underlining Newman’s international appeal, Britain’s Independent on Sunday featured his photograph across the whole of page one, relegating the latest news of the country’s banking woes to the inside pages.

“Paul Newman: Death of King Cool” ran the caption headline in the Sunday Times above a portrait of the heartthrob and philanthropist, who died of cancer aged 83.

The Observer weekly devoted a two-page spread under the words: “An Actor of True Genius and a Man of Great Decency”, focusing on Newman’s philanthropy and devotion to his family, as well as on his big screen roles.

In France, politicians lined up to praise Newman, with President Nicolas Sarkozy, hailing him as a “Hollywood legend”.

“Actor, author, screenwriter, director, producer and philanthropist, he was also a great friend of France and fans of motor racing, will remember his successive appearances at the Le Mans 24-hour race,” Sarkozy said in a statement.

“The death of a good guy,” France’s main Sunday newspaper, Le Journal du Dimanche, said in a headline, giving over most of its front page to a photo of the US actor.

Even conservative Muslim Iran, which would not usually concern itself with reporting on a Western film star, marked his death. Two pro-reform newspapers displayed the actor on their front pages while Iran’s state media also reported his death.

Several obituaries repeated comments he made about his famous good looks. — Reuters

Yoga effective to
treat arthritis
DUBAI: A minimum of 12 sessions of yoga can improve the health of rheumatoid arthritis patients, a study has said. The pilot study, by a team of specialists at the UAE’s Emirates Arthritis Foundation, was presented at the 13th Congress of the Asia Pacific League of Associations for Rheumatology held recently in Yokohama, Japan, a Khaleej Times report said. — PTI

Men find women’s bodies more attractive in winter
LONDON: The fair sex might find it hard to believe but a new study has claimed that women’s bare flesh in winter is a bigger turn-on for men. A team at Wroclaw University in Poland has carried out the study and found that men actually find women’s bodies more attractive in the winter, a revelation they claim might have an impact on mate choice and on levels of adultery. — PTI

Melamine found in China food products
JAKARTA: Indonesia’s health ministry said melamine had been detected in 12 food items from China, including cookies, candies and drinks, as the fall-out of China’s tainted-milk scandal spread to Southeast Asia’s biggest economy. Indonesia’s Food and Drug Monitoring Agency found that 12 out of 19 Chinese milk products on sale in the country tested positive for melamine, the health ministry said. — Reuters